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Notes -
Mostly this. There's probably more to be said about that optics of the deal than the substance, not least because of the multitude of interests in inflating / signal boosting the more propagandastic elements for, well, propaganda. At the end of the day, though, it doesn't 'make' people buy stuff, and almost certainly includes a lot of purchasing that would already happen regardless.
I do think one of the more salient / relevant / 'why this deal will pass despite the critics' is that it puts an end (for now) the tariff issue, whereas deliberately trying to scuttle it would re-raise the issue and likely lead to higher. As much as, say, Paris will love to hate on this bill and decry it and so on, the BATNA tariff is higher, not lower, to the tariff in this agreement.
I suspect- though can't say with too much confidence- that another of the elements of this deal is how it will probably shape the European military modernization funds. A lot of the most recent discussion on the face-saving/'what's really in it' has focused on the limits of compulsory purchasing. However, a bigger issue is if EU-wide funding mechanisms will have the 'buy Europe' clauses that were being pushed for. I wouldn't be surprised if even if this deal doesn't 'make' anyone buy US military goods, it also undoes legal restrictions on EU funds being used for that purpose. As in, no one has to buy American, but at the same time people can buy American with funds that were previously being advertised as excluding American.
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